


The First Water Dancer

by Isis



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Book 1: A Game of Thrones, Braavos, Gen, Missing Scene, Storytelling, Water Dancing, Worldbuilding, female warriors
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-22
Updated: 2019-03-22
Packaged: 2019-11-17 15:34:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,572
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18101378
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Isis/pseuds/Isis
Summary: Arya learns to see with her feet - and also with her eyes, and her mind - when Syrio Forel tells her the story of the first water dancer of Braavos.





	The First Water Dancer

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thedevilchicken](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thedevilchicken/gifts).



When Arya arrived at the Small Hall, it looked different than it usually did for her lessons. Most of the trestle tables and benches had been moved aside as usual, but two tables remained near the center of the room, separated by a distance of perhaps ten feet. A thick but narrow plank lay across both tables, connecting them. Arya judged that it was the width of her hand.

She heard the whistling of the wooden sword behind her right ear and turned in time to grab it before it hit the ground. Not graceful, but at least she hadn’t missed. She was getting better at it. Syrio Forel nodded and clicked his tongue. She shifted her hips into the stance he had shown her, with her arm held out before her, her eyes sighting along the line of the wooden sword.

He walked around her, occasionally making small noises or nodding; sometimes he moved quickly, or shouted in her ear, but she had learned that she was to hold her position and not waver despite the complaints from the muscles in her arm. After a while he said, “Stand on your right foot,” and she complied, extending her left leg behind her as though she were a sea-bird on the keep wall. Oddly, this seemed to ease the ache in her arm, just a little, and she smiled to herself as she filed away this bit of information.

“Enough,” said Syrio, clapping his hands once, and Arya lowered her arm and dropped her left foot back to the floor. He nodded toward the plank. “Now you will do the same on the beam.”

She scrambled onto one of the tables, then cautiously stepped onto the narrow plank, which seemed to bow a little under her weight.

“To the center, girl. Step your body sideface, do not be clomping, be dancing.”

She turned and stepped carefully, touching her toes to the beam and then letting her weight sink onto her leading leg. The beam quivered a little. Delicately she shifted her weight and stepped with her other foot. Then the leading foot again. It wasn’t bad, she told herself; she’d walked on the low walls of King’s Landing like this, and they had a much longer drop on one side. Of course the walls were four times as wide.

“Sword out,” said Syrio. “Stand on your right foot.”

The pose had felt natural just moments ago, when she’d been standing on the floor. But as Arya stretched her body into position, she was uncomfortably aware that her foot was balanced on a plank no wider than itself, with nothing but empty air on either side. It was stupid. She wasn’t that far above the floor. She hated the way her arms shook, the wobbly feeling in her ankle. _Light as a feather_ , she thought, reminding herself of Syrio’s words at her first lesson. _Graceful as a cat._

It was no use. In less than a minute, the wobble became a shake, and she lost whatever stability she had. If she dropped her left foot to the beam she’d be able to brace herself again, but it wouldn’t matter; she’d already lost. She hung on for as long as she could, her left arm shaking under the weight of the wooden sword, her right arm windmilling behind her for balance, until she could balance no longer and she fell awkwardly to the floor. 

“Again,” said Syrio. “The sword in your right hand this time, and your weight on your left foot. A water dancer can stand on one toe for as long as is needing.”

This was a little harder, and she didn’t last as long. As she picked herself up off the floor, she asked, “Do water dancers in Braavos fight on beams like this?” He looked at her, frowning slightly, and she amended her question: “I mean, do you dance on beams like this?”

“Like this? No. This is only for practice, very low to the ground so that you are not hurting yourself.” Arya nodded. She left the Small Hall with bruises after every session, but she wasn’t _hurt_ , not really. “In Braavos there are no trees, so we have no beams for dancing. But there are high cliffs, yes? And stone walls. It is said that Nara Logare, the first of the water dancers, strung a cord between the Titan’s ankles and challenged other bravos to duel her upon it.”

“Her? So girls are water dancers, too!”

“I would not be teaching you otherwise, child. She was a sword, as you shall be – if you are getting off the floor and back onto the beam,” he added pointedly, and Arya scrambled back to the beam. 

She held the poses he asked for until her muscles ached and sent her tumbling. When she thought she had mastered the art of standing on one foot, he blindfolded her, and suddenly the solid wood under her toes turned to shifting sand, and she fell again. 

“A water dancer never falls,” Syrio told her, and she nodded and got back up. 

When the lesson was over she was bruised and aching from all her falls, but she didn’t care. She practiced every chance she could, in the corridors and on the steps, and when her father frowned she repeated Syrio’s words. She was to be a water dancer, like the great Nara Logare, and that meant she had to practice until she could stand on the beam without falling. Until she could stand on a cord stretched between the castle towers and thrust Needle into whoever was foolish enough to follow.

At her next lesson, Arya didn’t fall off the beam, even when blindfolded. When Syrio let her take off the blindfold, she realized with a start that he was standing on the beam in front of her. She frowned. “I didn’t feel the beam move when you stepped on it.”

“You must see with your feet, not with your eyes. And you must be stepping so quietly that you cannot be seen. Now, right!” As he called, he whipped his wooden sword toward her, and she parried, though the blow made her stumble. “High!” This time, already unbalanced, Arya couldn’t bring her own sword around in time, and she slipped from the beam, though she landed on her feet.

As she climbed back onto the table, she asked, “Did anyone ever duel the lady water dancer you told me about, on the cord between the Titan’s legs?”

“Nara Logare,” said Syrio. “One of the finest dancers of Braavos.”

“Nara Logare,” repeated Arya. She stepped onto the beam, her body turned to the side, her wooden blade held out in front. “Well, did anyone fight with her? Did she win?”

“Of course she won. But it was not between the Titan’s legs, for the bravos then were not yet water dancers, and none would follow her as she laughed and danced far above the waves. Left!”

Arya had been expecting that Syrio would not stop the practice just to tell her a story, and she was ready for the blow. She countered, and he spun lithely on his toes, blocking her blade. He looked as comfortable as if he were on the widest street in King’s Landing, instead of on a wooden beam only a handspan wide. 

Twice more Arya fell to the floor, and each time she clambered up again and held out her sword. They sparred until Arya was flushed and panting, and finally Syrio called a halt.

“You see? When you are thinking of the blade you are not thinking of your feet.”

“But I didn’t fall that time,” she protested.

“Just so. Your feet, they are knowing what to do. They are seeing the beam.”

Arya nodded as she understood. She’d been paying attention to his sword-arm, working to keep out from under his blade, trying to land her own blows; at some point she’d forgotten she was on the narrow beam and just moved where she needed to go. 

“And so it was with Nara Logare,” said Syrio. He sat on one of the benches at the side of the room, and motioned for Arya to sit as well. “Are you knowing the history of Braavos?”

Arya shook her head.

“This was being a long time ago, long before the time of Syrio Forel, when dragons still flew in the skies. Men and women, slaves in Valyria, found freedom in the north and named their city Braavos. These were people of every profession, yes? Ironsmiths and healers and circus performers. But,” he said, holding up a finger, “among these, there were no soldiers. Can you tell me why?”

“Because they were slaves?”

“Just so. No wealthy lord would be giving a slave a weapon that might be used against him, yes? But it is in the nature of men to fight, and so the ironsmiths and the sons of ironsmiths made swords, and taught themselves how to use them.”

“They weren’t water dancers,” guessed Arya.

“They were the first of the bravos, and they dueled to see which was the best at the slashing and stabbing. But there is more to fighting than slashing and stabbing, yes? It was not the son of an ironsmith, but the daughter of a circus performer, Nara Logare, who showed them to look beyond the sword. She was the first to duel upon the Moon Pool at the palace of the Sealord, the first to be called a water dancer.”

“She _did_ duel, then! Did she win?”

Syrio smiled. “Ah, that is a story! And I am thinking it is a good story for a girl to hear, for it will tell you something important about seeing with your feet – and also with your eyes. The bravos of the time saw Nara Logare with their eyes, and this is what they saw: a beautiful young woman, with hair like a soft cloud and a sharp blade in her hand, dancing on a cord high above the waters where the ships enter the harbor of Braavos.

“The bravos were young men, and when they were seeing Nara Logare whirling and dancing, they all wanted to come to her notice, to be maybe the one she would decide to marry. It was said that she would only marry the man who could defeat her in a duel on the cord between the Titan’s legs. The bravos protested, saying that if one were to defeat her on the cord so high, she would fall, and the falling from such a great height would break her neck on the water, and then nobody would be marrying.”

“I bet they were just scared,” said Arya scornfully.

“Perhaps,” said Syrio. “But Nara Logare agreed. She told the bravos that she would meet them at the Moon Pool, on a dark night lit only by the bright stars and the smallest sliver of moonlight. When these men and their swords came to the place, she was standing on the far edge. All they could see was the shape of her in the darkness.

“They say she called out to them: ‘Who will duel with me? Who will meet me and my blade? If you would duel me you must dance upon the water, as I do.’ She stepped out onto the water’s surface, spinning and dancing, her blade flashing silvery like a leaping fish. Then she returned to the edge of the pool and waited.”

“That’s not possible,” scoffed Arya. “You can’t stand on top of water. You’d fall in.”

“Nara Logare did not fall into the water. She moved so quickly that the water was not having any time to pull her in. This is why those who follow her teachings are called water dancers, for lightly do we dance upon the water, and swiftly do we strike.”

Arya wondered if Syrio could dance on the waters of the harbor at King’s Landing without falling in. Maybe if she worked hard, and practiced all the time, she’d be able to dance on the harbor, too. That would be great fun; she imagined jumping onto the waters in front of Sansa, her horrified screams turning to wonder as she saw Arya dancing across the waves without even getting wet.

“The first bravo stepped up onto the low wall around the Moon Pool. Nara Logare leaped forward, her blade out, and advanced across the water. The man who would be her husband stepped onto the Moon Pool, and sank into the water to here.” Syrio indicated the middle of his thigh. “She laughed, and danced, and struck him on the shoulders three times before he could move, for moving through water is much harder than moving on it. He retreated to the edge, and climbed out again, his face ashamed.

“The second bravo met the same fate, and the third. And so it was that the men who thought they could duel the circus performer’s daughter watched what had happened, and retreated.”

Arya looked at her teacher. “And that was it? They all fell in the water? What did Nara Logare do?”

“There was a fourth bravo, who had been seeing, instead of only watching. When the others left, he looked across the Moon Pool, and said, ‘That was like watching fishes trying to duel with an eagle. I will not fight you, Nara Logare. I would learn from you, instead. Teach me how to fight like an eagle. Teach me to dance on the water.’

“She looked at the bravo, and she said, ‘Show me why I should be teaching my secrets to you, then. And if I am liking your answer, you shall be my student, and maybe my husband, too.’”

“What did he say?”

Syrio shook his head. “You are not listening, girl.”

Arya thought over Syrio’s words. Nara Logare had not said _tell me_. “What did he do?”

“Ah,” said Syrio. “That is what you will be telling _me_.”

“But I don’t know the story!”

Syrio stood. “Then your lesson is over. If you are wanting to be a water dancer, you must be seeing and not only watching. You must be listening and not only hearing.”

Reluctantly, Arya got to her feet. It seemed unfair to her that her teacher expected her to know the ending to a story she’d never heard, from the history of a place she’d never been. But she’d been coming to these lessons long enough that she knew that Syrio always had reasons for what he had her do, whether it was catching cats or standing on one foot on a plank between two tables. 

As she walked slowly to the door, in her mind she went over the story Syrio had told her. About Nara Logare, daughter of a circus performer, dancing on a cord high above the harbor; about how she challenged the bravos to duel her on the Moon Pool, on a dark night. And then she knew the answer.

She spun around. “He took his sword and he slashed it through the water of the Moon Pool,” she said triumphantly. “He cut through the cord that she’d hidden in the water.”

“What for are you going to the door, girl?” Syrio smiled, and Arya felt a warmth deep in her heart. “Now, you will be getting back on the beam, and we shall spar some more.”


End file.
